Russian President Vladimir Putin has given instructions to the government as a follow-up to the state-of-the-nation address

MOSCOW, December 5. /TASS/. Russian President Vladimir Putin has instructed Russia’s Defense Ministry, Federal Service for Financial Monitoring and the Bank of Russia to develop and introduce a system of controlling the use of funds in placing and implementing the state defense contract.

According to the document placed on the Kremlin’s official website, the prime minister, the chairman of the military-industrial commission’s collegium, Dmitry Rogozin, was instructed to coordinate the work to control the money allocated for defense contracts.

The instructions emphasize the need for “revising the powers of the federal service for financial monitoring to control all transactions related with the performance of the state defense contract.”

Government ordered to cut federal budget spending by at least 5% in 2015-2017

Vladimir Putin has instructed the Russian government to cut federal budget spending by at least five percent a year in 2015-2017 by reducing inefficient expenditures.

The president also instructed to submit proposals on gradual centralization of the functions of a technical authority in the sphere of federal budget-sponsored capital construction of civil facilities.

The president has issued an instruction to the government to revise the system of bonuses to top executives of Russian state corporations with account of a decrease of operation costs by 2% to 3% a year.

Other instructions to the government

The govenment has also been ordered to determine the volume of purchases by companies with state capital from small and medium-sized firms before March 31, 2015.

Putin ordered to take measures designed to expand the access of small and medium-sized companies to the purchases carried out under the federal law on purchases of goods, works and services by separate types of legal entities by determining the annual volume of purchases which customers will be obliged to buy from small and medium-sized firms.

The cabinet is to create a mechanism coordinating the placement of orders for purchases of foreign equipment by January 31, 2015. “/The government/ will ensure creation of a mechanism coordinating placement of orders for purchases of equipment and services abroad, carried out within the framework of large investment projects implemented by state organisations and joint stock societies with a state share of over 50%, or investment projects with state support,” the list of presidential instructions reads.

Vladimir Putin has instructed the government to draft a law on the “off-shore amnesty” by July 15, 12015.

“Amendments shall be done in legislation of the Russian Federation, stipulating that Russian individuals be relieved of tax and criminal responsibility on a nonrecurring basis under a condition that they will bring back to the Russian jurisdiction the incomes they had gained in the Russian Federation and later withdrawn under foreign jurisdictions without paying taxes,” the list of the presidential instructions reads.

Putin also instructed Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev to adjust forecasts of Russia’s medium-term socio-economic development on the basis of a scenario providing for a decline in inflation to 4%, the Kremlin website said on Friday.

The prime minister has also been instructed to adjust socio-economic development forecasts on the basis of a scenario of the Russian economy’s more-than-world’s average annual growth, labour productivity growth of at least 5% and to outline conditions how to achieve these indices and concurrently ensure macroeconomic balance. A report on this issues is to be submitted to the president by April 15, 2015.

Dmitry Medvedev is to take urgent measures to recapitalize system-relevant credit organizations if they direct additional financial resources to credit the real sector of economy at moderate interest rates.

Medvedev and Central Bank Chairwoman Elvira Nabiullina are supposed to execute it by February 1, 2015, says the document.

Putin has issued a recommendation to the Central Bank of Russia (CBR) and the cabinet of ministers to take coordinated steps against jobber operations and manipulative actions on the Russian currency market.

He also demanded that the CBR and the cabinet report to him on the measures taken on December 25 and to make subsequent reports quarterly.